HANDGUNS for self defense...

[mowlasley]

I'd feel safer if NO ONE had hand guns.

Since this is impossible, I would feel safer that since they will have handguns, I get to have one, too.

 

[Grifter144]

Since this is impossible, I would feel safer that since they will have handguns, I get to have one, too.

i concur as long as the bad guys buy em illegally i will buy em legally..... back on topic

Hey Red, i dont know you or your family personaly and i look forward to meeting you and others here soon...just wanted to wish you luck..pick something (weapon wise)you are comfortable with and train with it...sounds like their is alot of firearm expeince on here. i dont know how old your kids are but if they are old enough once you know what you think is enough, remember to teach them and your wife. this way we ensure that no accidents happen when dad or mom aint home. gun safes are good but my lil bro could open ours on his own when he was six...just a thought take it for what its worth....

Maier( as you can tell from my sig Army Rangers)

my choices...sig sauer 220 (fullsize 45) trigger is heavy enough a kid cant pull it and my girl has trouble rackin the slide)

Mossberg 500(50517..www.mossberg.com).excellent for home defense but.downside if a kid ever got it down on the floor the trigger is relatively light and easy to pull..
food for thought....Once agin Good Luck....oh yea its good to see a man who values his family enough to maybe change his way of thinking and put himself in a relatively uncomfortable position(or so it sounds) in order to protect their lively hood....RLTW

 

[BoC]

I shoot a berreta 9mm it has never failed. My buddy is a cop he shoots a GLOCK. If you suspect youll be shooting indoors during a problem with others in the house, get a shotgun.(pump)

 

[BoC]

i keep a mossburg 500 pump with #4 3" for home protection(its ma turkey gun lol. The gun is short and the slide of a 12 gauge cocking can be scary in a smaller indoor space

 

[Eagle]

One last thing to consider. When you fire a weapon, that bullet goes somewhere. It may miss your intended target...but it goes somewhere! That is one of the biggest benefits to a shotgun for home defense. At close range (in the home) it has a HUGE ballistic impact, plus you dont have to really "aim". Additionally, bullets (pistol) will travel through several walls, windows, doors, whatever, and still have deadly force potential, a shotgun blast will pretty much "peter out" as soon as it hits its first obstacle.

You're joking with us, right?

I hope.

00 ("double ought") buckshot is .33" in diameter -- that's .32 caliber, folks -- and the muzzle velocity of a standard (not magnum) 12-gauge 00 buckshot shell is between 1100 and 1300 feet per second. And there are 9 to 12 of those .33 caliber pellets in there.

For comparison, the muzzle velocity of a 9mm pistol round is between 1000 and 1200 feet per second and a 9mm bullet is about a .35 or .36 caliber -- not much difference from the 00 buck. Heck, #4 buckshot is .24" in diameter, has a muzzle velocity of around 1200 feet per second, and holds between 27 and 41 pellets. Think about that -- a box of .22 cartridges holds 50. ONE shot using #4 buckshot is almost the equivalent of blasting away at the walls of your house with an entire box of .22 ammunition.

Don't get me wrong -- I'm not knocking the use of a shotgun for home defense. I think it's an excellent choice. But DO NOT make the mistake of thinking a sheetrock wall is going to stop a shotgun pellet any better than it stops a pistol bullet. Ain't gonna happen.

So how do you figure that a couple of layers of sheetrock are going to stop or even slow down those 9 or 12 .33 caliber lead or steel balls that come flying out of that shotgun?

http://theboxotruth.com/

Go to article #3 -- "The Shotgun Meets the Box O' Truth"

 

[BoC]

USE #4 turkey load. I love the smell of gun powder

 

[ECKSJAY]

The gun is short and the slide of a 12 gauge cocking can be scary in a smaller indoor space

I wouldn't hear it with the auto noise cutout on my Peltor 7S electronic muffs. Turn those things up all the way and I can hear the cat snoring downstairs. Have to fire indoors the muffs will cut out and save my sanity.

 

[8Mud]

You're joking with us, right?

I hope.

00 ("double ought") buckshot is .33" in diameter -- that's .32 caliber, folks -- and the muzzle velocity of a standard (not magnum) 12-gauge 00 buckshot shell is between 1100 and 1300 feet per second. And there are 9 to 12 of those .33 caliber pellets in there.

For comparison, the muzzle velocity of a 9mm pistol round is between 1000 and 1200 feet per second and a 9mm bullet is about a .35 or .36 caliber -- not much difference from the 00 buck. Heck, #4 buckshot is .24" in diameter, has a muzzle velocity of around 1200 feet per second, and holds between 27 and 41 pellets. Think about that -- a box of .22 cartridges holds 50. ONE shot using #4 buckshot is almost the equivalent of blasting away at the walls of your house with an entire box of .22 ammunition.

Don't get me wrong -- I'm not knocking the use of a shotgun for home defense. I think it's an excellent choice. But DO NOT make the mistake of thinking a sheetrock wall is going to stop a shotgun pellet any better than it stops a pistol bullet. Ain't gonna happen.

So how do you figure that a couple of layers of sheetrock are going to stop or even slow down those 9 or 12 .33 caliber lead or steel balls that come flying out of that shotgun?

http://theboxotruth.com/

Go to article #3 -- "The Shotgun Meets the Box O' Truth"

The only way to know for sure, is to go out yourself and fire it at different ranges, through different materials. Be carefull of metal, it may come back at you.
I did a lot of that with the detachment down in Bad Tolz, I was a small part of a truth table they devised. My part had nothing to do with this thread, but I did watch what they were up to, it was interesting. Learned a slug will most times go right through a car side to side. Pistol rounds, often don´t make it to the interior and often bounce off a windshield.
Shot lead deforms pretty quickly, actually much of it is deformed when it leaves the barrel (but they are getting better at fixing this). The mass of the single pellet 00 buck is much less than the mass of a say 9 MM round. If I wasn´t so lazy I´d go wiegh both, down in the cellar.
After it hits the first layer, it losses velocity and the remaining energy is spread over a larger area, when it hits the second layer. Loses a lot of velocity, and kinetic energy. Would I want to be standing on the other side of a sheet rock wall, when a load of buck shot came through, heck no. But it probably would be better than a magnum round.
Jacketed ammo doesn´t deform nearly as much, if your lucky it will tumble. Pistol rounds are spin stabilzed, pellets aren´t. A 9 MM round halves it energy in 100 yards. At a hundred yards, I doubt a 00 pellet will penetrate levis, but heck, think I´ll try it out and know for sure.
I use number 2 goose shot, though the first round in my home defence shotgun, is skeet shot (pretty much like shooting sand). But don´t get that wrong either. At close range (like a few feet) a wad of skeet shot, will make a pretty neat hole, most of the way through your body. I use lead bullets, in a flat nose format, low velocity in my psitol home loads. And actually for finishing off, rather large pigs, that just refuse to die. The typical wound channel for a .44 special, low velocity lead bullet, is a cratter about the size of am egg, maybe closer to a lemon.
I shoot a lot of Fox, 00 Buck shot is second choice at moderate ranges. From zero through 15 meters. I´m talking hundreds of Foxes, most of them run off and die in the brush with 00, with number 2 Goose shot, you can usually walk over and pick up your pelt. I´ve never tried number 4 Buck. The whys and what fors, I can´t tell you, just know it works for me. I don´t ever remember a 00 shot gun pellet, doing a through and through on a Fox, but maybe, next time I´ll look closer.
Personnally, my only worries are it flying out of a open window, my outer walls are foot thick brick, inside walls 8" brick, windows are double pane. The floors/ceilings are two layers of 3/4 inch oak, a 3/4" plywood top and packed with light clay between the joices. The half Cellar has 18" walls and the cellar roof is 4" concret reinforced with I beams every 18". House was built shortly after WW II. I´m more worried about ricochets and if one gets out the window how far it will fly.
I wrote my piece, before reading Eagles, link.

 

[Fatalfunnel]

You're joking with us, right?

I hope.

00 ("double ought") buckshot is .33" in diameter -- that's .32 caliber, folks -- and the muzzle velocity of a standard (not magnum) 12-gauge 00 buckshot shell is between 1100 and 1300 feet per second. And there are 9 to 12 of those .33 caliber pellets in there.

For comparison, the muzzle velocity of a 9mm pistol round is between 1000 and 1200 feet per second and a 9mm bullet is about a .35 or .36 caliber -- not much difference from the 00 buck. Heck, #4 buckshot is .24" in diameter, has a muzzle velocity of around 1200 feet per second, and holds between 27 and 41 pellets. Think about that -- a box of .22 cartridges holds 50. ONE shot using #4 buckshot is almost the equivalent of blasting away at the walls of your house with an entire box of .22 ammunition.

Don't get me wrong -- I'm not knocking the use of a shotgun for home defense. I think it's an excellent choice. But DO NOT make the mistake of thinking a sheetrock wall is going to stop a shotgun pellet any better than it stops a pistol bullet. Ain't gonna happen.

So how do you figure that a couple of layers of sheetrock are going to stop or even slow down those 9 or 12 .33 caliber lead or steel balls that come flying out of that shotgun?

http://theboxotruth.com/

Go to article #3 -- "The Shotgun Meets the Box O' Truth"

No...sheetrock will not stop shotgun pellets. CERTAINLY won't stop a slug. What it will do is "scrub off" velocity of pellets more than it will scrub the velocity of a bullet. I'm not talking about someone standing on the other side of the wall being safe...but someone accross the street will be "SAFER".

Your example fails to factor in bullet/pellet weight.
00 Buck-54 gr
.40 cal -155-180 gr
Both at roughly around 1000 fps

Would you rather stand on the other side of a piece of sheetrock while I fire ping-pong balls, or golf balls???

There are many factors to consider, and it can get kinda confusing, especially for someone unfamiliar with firearms. Hence my original advice to keep it SIMPLE.

Great website you linked to also...good info.

 

[RichP]

As a long time hunter who grew up in NJ where you could ONLY hunt with a shotgun for small game and deer the full choked 12ga 3 1/2" high brass peters out pretty quick. Your chances of downing a buck at a 100yards with one is just about nill, pretty iffy at 75yards and almost a done deal at 50. Thats open air, no obstuctions such as branches, tall weeds or peta activitsts, etc...

 

[8Mud]

As a long time hunter who grew up in NJ where you could ONLY hunt with a shotgun for small game and deer the full choked 12ga 3 1/2" high brass peters out pretty quick. Your chances of downing a buck at a 100yards with one is just about nill, pretty iffy at 75yards and almost a done deal at 50. Thats open air, no obstuctions such as branches, tall weeds or peta activitsts, etc...

Off thread, but I´d love to introduce you to a Deer we have here, Called a Reh Deer. Guys who first see them laugh and say the rabbits are bigger in Texas. They rarley get more than 50 pounds. I wanna see the look on your face when you shot one with a rifle and it takes off running over the next ridge. Saying to yourself, darned missed and an oldtimer saying, just sit here a minute and wait (till it stops and bleeds out), then getting up and start following the blood trail, usually 30 yards sometimes 60 or more. Darned tough little Deer. I´ve put two rifle rounds, within an inch of each other, in there heart and still had the Reh run 65 yards, mostly up a ridge. The heart was jello, it would run through your fingers when you tried to hold it. Elk and Wild boar, are easier to bring down than a Reh, most times. Point of my ramble, nothing really, just struck me as really funny, someone shooting at a Reh with a shotgun (maybe a slug), thinking New Jersey Deer are real wimps .